Leigh Kallestad and Giovanna Cruz are both experienced music educators. As part of MakeMusic’s Education Services team, they recently led a webinar panel discussion, along with guests Dr. Glenn Pohland, professor at Loras College, IA and Mike Gibson, Director of Bands at Ridgeview Middle School, in Sandy Springs, GA.
Both Glenn and Mike have currently switched from the classic SmartMusic to the new web-based SmartMusic.
Now that school has let out hopefully your preparation for the marching season has already begun. The summer is an important time for front ensemble members to work on the mechanics of their technique as well as build muscle and consistency. As long as the students have mallets at home, they can work on these things even if they don’t have a full keyboard available to them.
By now you’ve probably heard there is a new web-based version of SmartMusic available. If you are a classic SmartMusic user you are likely wondering why you should switch to the new version. We recently hosted a webinar titled “Why Switch to the New SmartMusic?” so you could see exactly why.
Editor’s note: On National Teacher Appreciation Day we recognized Jamie Clark, who is the jazz band, concert band, and orchestra director at Trottier Middle School in Southborough, Massachusetts. Today author/educator Meredith O’Brien, who’s written a book about Mr. Clark, shares five teaching lessons she learned in the process.
He doles out hugs like they’re candy.
What do you wish you’d known before you became a music teacher?
You probably have more than one answer. You might think of those topics you still consider a challenge, obstacles you’ve worked hard to overcome, or issues that you know that other teachers are still struggling with.
Summer is here!
To celebrate, we’ve added 19 new ensemble titles to the SmartMusic Repertoire Library. Included are pieces for choir, concert band, and string orchestra.
There’s also one new piece for jazz band. Just one? Well, heck, those kids can improvise! View the complete list.
Many commonalities exist between the band and orchestra, yet an unnecessary divide can develop between the two. In our previous post, we began to bridge this gap by looking at what bands can learn from orchestras. This week we consider the reverse question.
Parallel of Breath and Articulation to BowingsThe weight and speed of the bow have a direct correlation to the attack and speed of the air in wind instruments.
The Title I building where I work set a school-wide goal to increase student motivation and engagement. We hope that improving grades and content retention will decrease the learning gap revealed by state and national tests. As part of our Title I training, we were given Eric Jensen’s book “Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind.” We were instructed to meet in groups of 4-6 teachers, once a month, to read, answer specific questions, discuss, and record our responses.
Bob Phillips is widely renowned as an innovator in string education. An award-winning ASCAP composer with 27 years of experience as a public school string teacher, he is also the author of several popular methods—all published by Alfred Music—including String Explorer and Sound Innovations.
Bob recently gave a masterclass titled: “Get Kids to Practice and Turbocharge their Results.” In it, he:
Shares insights on how we learn, Provides techniques you can use to motivate your students to practice more effectively, and Demonstrates how to apply some of these ideas with your students via SmartMusic.
Many commonalities exist between the band and orchestra, yet an unnecessary divide can develop between the two. As leaders of large ensembles we are united by many common factors. Some of these factors are quite obvious and others may be less so. It is clear that critical listening skills are mutually important; however, we propose that some less obvious commonalities between the band and orchestra become evident when critical listening is employed across the divide.